Posts Tagged ‘News’

I am in favor of paying students according to their merit, but the system still has to work. If it doesn’t make sense, it certainly doesn’t sufficiently reward the best teachers. This video shows what happens when legislators configure a shoddy system of tying a teacher’s worth with data from standardised testing.

By next year, salary raises for all Florida public school teachers will depend in part on how their students perform on the state’s standardized tests.

But there’s been lots of controversy about how Florida measures students’ progress using something called a “value-added model,” or VAM.

Last month, an Indian River County teacher named Luke Flynt raised a major issue with the state’s model, which tries to measure teachers’ impact on students by assigning students predicted scores and then measuring whether they exceeded them.

Flynt’s issue: In some cases, students’ expected scores are “literally impossible.” He tells school board members:

“One of my sixth-grade students had a predicted score of 286.34. However, the highest a sixth-grade student can earn earn is 283. The student did earn a 283, incidentally. Despite the fact that she earned a perfect score, she counted negatively toward my valuation…

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The penalty for assaulting a teacher should be greater than for assaulting a stranger on the street corner, because our education system is doomed unless teachers are given unprecedented protection from harm. I want the coverage of this student’s punishment to be just a prominent as his gutless body slam. Look at how vulnerable the teacher is. If he defends himself in any way he would have risked losing his career. What is a teacher supposed to do when they are being violently assaulted? Personally, I would let my student beat me up. My job is worth more to me than my medical record. I want every impressionable student to watch such offenders get significant sentences for their inexcusable crimes:

A YEAR nine student in the US has been arrested after he allegedly slamming his teacher to the floor during class — over a mobile phone.

Police said the New Jersey high school physics teacher confiscated the student’s mobile phone during class which led to the attack.

The attack, captured on another video phone, shows the teen wrapping his arms around the 62-year-old teacher and pushing him into an empty desk.

The exchange quickly escalated when the boy wrestled the man across the classroom and slammed him to the floor.

In the video, the teacher initially tries to continue talking to the class but is later heard yelling what sounds like, “Let me go”.

Other students in the class move out of the way but do not intervene and finally yell for security once the teacher is on the ground.

Bullying in all shapes and forms is inexcusable but I particularly hate to see people being tormented for the colour of their skin, the country their country of origin or the in vogue tradition of victimising boys with red hair:

Without warning, a boy in uniform is pushed.

But it’s soon clear, this is no schoolyard tiff.

After being grabbed and pummelled, the victim is thrown to ground and swiftly kicked in the head.

Four left fists follow before a second kick, and a third to finish him off.

The young thug then adjusts his cap as he coolly walks away.

The unprovoked attack at Ringwood Station was carried out last October by a 15-year-old boy, who can’t be named for legal reasons.

He pleaded guilty in a children’s court and was sentenced to 12 months probation.

The violent teen is the son of a prominent AFL player – but instead of using his skills on the sporting field, the boy is getting his kicks by preying on others.

While the boy hasn’t been named, 7News understands teenagers know who he is and several have also been harassed or assaulted by him but have been too frightened to come forward.

Psychologist Dr Simon Kinsella says such aggression in young males is all too common.

“Very often they’re trying to maintain their reputation amongst their peers as being a tough person, a tough guy, and they don’t give any real consideration to what impact it might have on the victim,” he told 7News.

The victim’s parents hope their son’s courage will encourage others to go to police.

Two mothers became embroiled in a bitter Facebook battle over an invoice handed to one of their sons for missing the other’s birthday party.

Tanya Walsh and her partner Derek Nash were appalled when their son Alex, five, arrived home from school with a £15.95 bill for missing his classmate Charlie Lawrence’s big day at a local ski centre.

After refusing to pay, Alex’s parents were threatened that they would be taken to court.

Since then Miss Walsh and Charlie’s mother Julie Lawrence have become entangled in a war of words.

‘I messaged Julie on Facebook to say sorry and let’s resolve this amicably. And she said: “The amicable way I believe is for you to pay me the money. And let that be a lesson learnt,’ Miss Walsh, 30, said.

‘The next thing I heard she was taking us to small claims court. My partner went to see her and it ended in an argument. She shouted down the street: “Don’t mess with me”.

‘Every time I spoke to her previously she was always very polite,’ Miss Walsh added.

‘All of this is very shocking.’

‘Julie could have tried to contact us before issuing the bill. If she had spoken to us we would have considered paying it.

I could totally understand her point. It is not about the money for us and we did not mean to let them down. It is the way she has gone about it.’

But Mrs Lawrence said in a statement: ‘All details were on the party invite. They had every detail needed to contact me.‘

Alex’s father however said he had no means of contacting the woman, resorting to trying to find her at the children’s school gates to apologise.

‘My partner looked out for [Mrs Lawrence] to apologise for Alex not showing up to the party, but didn’t see her.

‘But on January 15 she looked in Alex’s school bag and found a brown envelope. It was an invoice for £15.95 for a child’s party no-show fee.’

I don’t care if the teacher initiated, was groomed, it happened accidentally or it was planned, when a teacher has sex with his student he must be imprisoned for long enough to deter others from going down the same road:

Child protection campaigners have reacted angrily after a judge declined to jail a teacher who had a sexual affair with a teenage pupil, on the basis that he had been “groomed” by his victim.

Stuart Kerner, 44, a married religious studies teacher, was given a suspended 18-month jail term after being convicted of an illicit relationship with the 16-year-old student during which the pair had sex at his school in south-east London and at his home.

Judge Joanna Greenberg QC said she was allowing Kerner, a vice principal at Bexleyheath Academy, to walk free after finding his victim had been “stalking” him. Sitting at the Inner London Crown Court, Mrs Justice Greenberg described the teenage victim as “intelligent and manipulative”, adding: “Her friends described her, accurately in my view, as stalking you.

“If grooming is the right word to use, it was she who groomed you [and] you gave in to temptation.”

The remarks by the 63-year-old judge, who has sat on the bench for almost 20 years and last year became a circuit judge – one rank below a place in the High Court – were criticised as “astonishing” by child abuse workers.

Campaigners accused Judge Greenberg of seeking to transfer blame on to the victim when teachers have a legal and professional responsibility to reject any sexual advances from pupils. Jon Brown, lead for tackling sexual abuse with the NSPCC, said: “Despite the alleged pressure that he was under from the girl in question, it’s still a fact that Stuart Kerner grossly abused his position of trust.

What on earth was the Principal thinking? Firstly, this dumb idea encourages children to fight gunmen with baked beans cans instead of running for cover, and secondly, it encourages parents to panic about a scenario that is both remote and strictly hypothetical.

A US high school has asked parents to arm their children with cans of food as part of its response plan against gun-armed intruders.

School officials from W.F. Burns Middle School in Valley, Alabama, wrote a letter to students’ parents, asking them to buy their children “an 8 oz canned food item (corn, beans, peas etc.) to use in case an intruder enters the classroom”.

“We hope the canned food items will never be used or needed, but it is best to be prepared.”

The strategy was inspired by the ALICE Training Institute, a company founded by a former police officer and a former primary school principal.

The institute follows the mantra of: Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter and Evacuate, and the cans of food are only a small — but still important — part of the whole procedure, school officials wrote.

“We realise at first this may seem odd; however, it is a practice that would catch an intruder off-guard,” the letter read.

“The canned food item could stun the intruder or even knock him out until the police arrive. The canned food item will give the students a sense of empowerment to protect themselves and will make them feel secure in case an intruder enters the classroom.”

Since the letter was sent out, it has been shared thousands of times, with some questioning its effectiveness.

But Chambers County School Superintendent Kelli Moore Hodge told CNN via email that the point of the training “is to be able to get kids evacuated and not be sitting ducks hiding under desks”.

Since the year 2000, the US has suffered through more than 100 school shootings, including the horrific 2012 Sandy Hook massacre, which claimed the lives of 27 people, 18 of them children.

I hope this doesn’t get dismissed as a kids’ fantasy. I really worry about my fellow colleagues. Teaching should be a far safer profession than it currently is:

THREE nine-year-old students have been caught plotting to kill their teacher with hand sanitiser.

The plot was foiled when concerned parents and a school board member became aware of the plan reported WGRZ.

Word initially got out when the students told their classmates about their evil plot.

The students said they were going to cover the classroom with hand sanitiser after they found out their female teacher was highly allergic to antibacterial products.

In a report provided by the Genesee County Sheriff’s Department, they said “the suspects made comments to other students that they were going to kill [the teacher] by putting antibacterial products around the classroom”.

When youth officers interviewed the suspected students with their parents and school officials present one student stated that her teacher “yells at us and that the class has problems with her.”

In the end police handed the matter back over to the school to deal with.

“When we realised they never followed through with it and they told us they had no intention of following through, we said there was not much we can do,” Genesee County Sheriff Chief Investigator Jerome E. Brewster told The Buffalo News.

How on earth are we going to attract the best teachers to a profession that is so appallingly bad at protecting the health and safety of its own? Teaching, especially in the upper years, can be an extremely daunting and scary proposition. I don’t care what his excuse is, this student needs to be made an example of:

A high school freshman has been caught on video allegedly punching his substitute teacher and putting him in a headlock, because he said he couldn’t go to the bathroom.

The vicious attack on part-time faculty member and football coach Ron Santavicca at Gorton High School in Yonkers, New York, was recorded on a cell phone by another student in the hallway.

The 16-year-old boy, who has not been named, is seen hitting the teacher and swearing as he grabs his head.

Witnesses described how the teacher told the student he could not leave after asking if he could use the restroom – prompting him to react violently.

Senior Rocio Vidao told CBS New York: ‘The teacher was, like, telling him, “Don’t leave,” and then the kid came out of the classroom, and the teacher went after him, and that’s when the kid attacked the teacher.

‘It’s not supposed to be like that, you know. When a teacher says no, it’s supposed to be a no.’

Police were called in to investigate the incident, but the student has not been arrested or charged.

Yonkers School District have however suspended him for five days and have arranged a superintendent’s board meeting, according to NBC New York.